


Memories of Dust

by matrixrefugee



Category: Firefly
Genre: Gen, Reminiscing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-22 16:05:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17665739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matrixrefugee/pseuds/matrixrefugee
Summary: Hauling cows brings Mal back to places he's put to the back of his mind...





	Memories of Dust

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [](http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/profile)[comment_fic](http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/)'s "Firefly, Mal, He remembers his ranch"

The transport of cows they were hauling for Warrick Harrow brought back memories for Mal: sunrise on Shadow, Ma calling up the laddeer to the loft, yelling at him to get up and get a bucket of milk before breakfast. Riding fences and mending any gaps or loose wires. Herding cattle to the railway and shipping them to a space bazaar. A cold snap, the cottonwoods behind the house and the barns covered in snow. Slaughtering hogs and hanging the hams up to smoke in the smokehouse. Hanging out in the bunkhouse with the hands as a teenager, listening to the old timers spinning yarns.

He left only to join the Independants, telling Ma that when he came back, they'd really be able to call the land their own, no more need to pay taxes to the Core planets.

When he came back ten years later, he found the place torched, burned to the ground by incendiary bombs by the Alliance. He turned his coattails to the rubble and hadn't been back since. Nothing to go back to, he could only stay flying, and keep going forward.


End file.
